This section provides background information related to the present disclosure which is not necessarily prior art.
Surgical resection is the cornerstone of treatment for the majority of tumors. Extent of resection (EOR), or the percentage of tumor removed during surgery, is an important prognostic factor, as most tumor recurrence occurs in or near the resection cavity. In low-grade brain cancer, a recent study showed that patients with at least 90% EOR had an 8-year overall survival rate of 91%, whereas patients with less than 90% EOR had an 8-year overall survival rate of 60%. There is mounting evidence that more extensive surgical resection is associated with longer life expectancy in high-grade glioma, as well. Unfortunately, safely maximizing the extent of resection, that is, removing cancerous regions while sparing healthy brain tissue, remains a challenge, in part due to the difficulty of differentiating tumor from normal brain tissue. Consequently, suboptimal surgical outcomes are common for brain tumor patients. A clinical study showed that among patients with safely resectable tumors, radiographically complete resection was achieved in only 23.5% of patients. In breast cancer, secondary surgeries also occur at a very high rate (10-45% rate depending on the hospital) as a residual tumor being identified post-surgery. In skin cancer the rate is at about 10%. Accordingly, devices and methods for improving EOR are desirable.